Hugo/Nebula Conteders and Popularity, October 2015
Here in New Mexico, fall is in the air, and 2015 is shockingly close to being over. It’s time to turn our attention to the 2016 awards seasons. Last year, I tried to track Goodreads stats a measure of popularity. This year, I’m tracking both Amazon and Goodreads.
I’ve been disappointed in both of those measures; neither seems particularly accurate or consistent, and they don’t seem to predict the eventual Hugo/Nebula winner at all. What is useful about them, though, is getting at least an early picture of what is popular and what is not. I do believe there is a minimum popularity cut off, where if you fall below a certain level (1000-2000 Goodreads votes), you don’t have much of a shot at winning a Hugo or Nebula. This also allows good comparisons between books that are similar to each other. If you think Uprooted and Sorcerer to the Crown are both contenders as “experimental”-ish fantasy books, one of those (Uprooted) is 10 times more popular than the other. If you had to pick between one of them being nominated, go with Novik.
We’re also very early—some of the biggest Hugo/Nebula contenders haven’t even come out yet! That’ll happen by next week. October 6 is one of the biggest publishing days of 2015, with new books by Leckie, Martin, Hurley, and Sanderson all hitting the shelves. Once we’re through that push, almost all of the major SFF books of 2015 will have been published, and we’ll really have chance to begin sifting through the year. At this point, a lot of readers don’t yet know what their “best” book of the year was, but that’ll become clearer over the next 2-3 months. So, on to the chart:
Table 1: Popularity of Hugo/Nebula Contenders, October 1, 2015
If you haven’t thought about popularity at all so far for 2015, this chart is very revealing. We have a tier of SFF novels that have sold very well, in that 10,000+ range on Goodreads. Armada, despite being broadly hated by segments of the SFF community for being too similar to Ready Player One and too pandering to 1980s nostalgia, already leads the pack. The vitriol surrounding that book will likely prevent it from receiving either a Hugo or Nebula nom; massive popularity, particularly when joined with negative reviews, can be a negative rather than a positive. The Ishiguro is more of a mainstream/literary text, and although moderately well-reviewed, is probably too much outside the SFF bailiwick to be a serious Hugo/Nebula contender.
That leaves Seveneves and Uprooted as early favorites. Seveneves is doing extraordinarily well on Amazon rankings, and is the kind of big, traditional, epic SF novel you think would do well at the Hugos. The Nebulas have ignored Stephenson since The Diamond Age; if Cryptonomicon and Anathem didn’t get Nebula noms, I’m not sure why Seveneves would. As I’ve written elsewhere, Uprooted is an early favorite for both Hugo and Nebula noms; it’s got the sales, the critical reviews, and the buzz.
Darker Shade of Magic isn’t a book I’ve considered much for a Hugo/Nebula nomination so far; maybe I need to change that. I’ll be interested to see if this shows up on year-end lists as a “best of.” Note how much better this book does on Goodreads than Amazon. That’s a good example of how those two different websites (despite both being owned by Amazon!) survey different audiences.
Other than those books, a couple things pop out at me from the chart. I haven’t seen a lot of online discussion of The Water Knife, but rankings are strong for that book. This is Bagicalupi’s first adult SF novel since his Hugo and Nebula winning The Windup Girl, and has to be considered a strong contender. Walton, Robinson, Scalzi, and Liu have all done fine: neither good nor bad, and have to be counted still in the mix.
Some books that got good pre-release buzz seem to have fallen flat in these popularity measures. Dinosaur Lords was talk of the town for a while, but that doesn’t seem to have translated to readers. The Okorafor is surprising; Book of Phoenix is the prequel to the Nebula nominated Who Fears Death, but those are very weak numbers 4 months after publication. I don’t think we can consider this a Nebula contender unless those numbers pick up.
Obviously, things are fluid. Last year’s Hugo winner The Three-Body Problem didn’t come out until November. Thins around going to change: the Sanderson is going to bound up the list in the next month, but is a western version of Mistborn appealing enough to break into the Hugo top 5? Is something like The Fifth Season, already off to a good start, going to accelerate or stall? Time will tell. Keep tuned!
Lastly, any books missing form the list that should be on? Chaos Horizon is just beginning to spin its gears for 2015, and I don’t want to leave any strong contenders off.
11 responses to “Hugo/Nebula Conteders and Popularity, October 2015”
Trackbacks / Pingbacks
- - October 14, 2015
- - October 15, 2015
Chaos Horizon 
I thought that Darker Shade of Magic’s popularity had to deal with Victoria Schwab’s YA work, but DSM actually has more ratings than any of those (by five in one case, but still). Interesting. I doubt it’s going to show up on the Hugo awards, but it’s a strong work and I’m awaiting the sequel.
I doubt Sanderson has a chance this year for Best Novel (novella, maybe). It’s the second book in the second part of series. No chance.
If you take out the Sad Puppy picks, Sanderson missed last year’s Hugo ballot by only 36 votes, also for the second book in a series. Massive popularity can do that for you in an award that is, on some level, a popularity contest. It would only take a little additional push to get Sanderson up into the Top 5. That said, I don’t think he’ll make it this year either—I have him down in the 9-10 range for 2016. Interestingly, he’s an author that seems poised to benefit from the EPH rule change. Authors with huge, passionate fan bases have an advantage in that system over the way voting currently works now, because single-author voters supporting someone like Mira Grant or Brandon Sanderson are less likely to get their votes divided up.
‘The Traitor Baru Cormorant’ by Seth Dickinson (‘The Traitor’ in UK) is getting some rave reviews on Goodreads. It might develop some buzz and become a contender. But I haven’t read it myself yet.
The Dickinson looks interesting, but more traditional fantasy (i.e. secondary world) has always had a tough time in the Hugos. It’ll have to catch fire over the next two to three months to have a chance. It just came out in the US on Sept 15th, and only has 256 Goodreads / 26 Amazon ratings. It is at 4.38 stars Goodreads / 4.9 Amazon, which is very high for a first novel. Interesting fact I learned: he appears to be one of the lead writer’s for the video game Destiny, at least in terms of crafting their lore. If he can bring the Destiny audience in . . .
Scanning what might be part of the Sad Puppy 4 campaign (and this is a big might), it looks like Seveneves, Uprooted, and Nemesis Games are all doing well. Armada has been brought up. If Kate Paulk does what she says she’ll do, those books will likely make the final recommendation list/slate.
A Long Time Until Now is getting brought up a lot, so if it made the final slate, it might have a good chance.
Two interesting mentions on SP4 are The Devils Only Friend by Dan Wells and Attack of Angels by Marko Kloos.
The Devil’s Only Friend is YA so I think it’s unlikely to make it unless it makes a slate. I also think Wells would be reluctant to accept a nomination for either the Hugo after having been unwillingly nominated for SP2 and subjected to a series of online and email attacks.
Attack of Angels I could see making it. The series has a large following (2,400 Goodreads ratings) and Kloos’s withdrawal this year gained him some friends. However, I could also see him bowing out of any nomination, being just fed up with the process.
Larry Correia also has book coming out the end of this month. I’m not sure if it will get a push for a Hugo. Correia might refuse the nomination if he got one.
On the list above, I’m wondering who would refuse a nomination after what happened this year. I could see Novik, Stevenson, Corey, Butcher, Pratchett, Sanderson, and Gannon all refusing nominations. That’s just an impression I get from interactions with these authors, but I could be wrong. It just seems like they would all rather do something else than defend their nomination for a Hugo.
Larry Correia has stated that he will never win a Hugo and will never accept a nomination for a Hugo again. I don’t know if he will change his mind, but he reads like someone who does not shroud his opinions.
Butcher accepted a nomination last year – why would he refuse this year? It is highly doubtful that any controversy would have a significant impact on his sales and he does not seem absorbed by “con politics.”
I’m curious if Ishiguro’s The Buried Giant will get any award attention, as a literary heavyweight invading genre a la Chabon’s Yiddish Policeman’s Union Hugo win. I personally thought the book was very good, but I kind of feel like any attention it might’ve gotten in the SFF field was drowned out by it being published right at the height of the Puppy arguments. Somehow Gaiman and LeGuin arguing with Ishiguro was less interesting to SF fandom than GRRM and Scalzi arguing with Correia and Torgersen.
How did you select these particular titles to compare?
Here’s my basic strategy for what books I look at: Review Round-Up Strategy.